Machinery Pete: Pack and Roll Momentum

In the past 22 years, I’ve written about almost every type of used farm equipment—tractors, combines, corn heads, planters, skid steers, disk chisels, trucks, grain trailers and balers. I guess I’ve never written about cultimulchers, though. Depending on where you’re from, you might call them cultipackers, roller packers, roller harrows, crowfoot harrows or harrow packers.

Just like most of the other segments of used equipment, cultimulcher auc­tion prices are amazingly high. Just a few weeks ago, a 2013 Brillion 25' folding cultipacker in like-new condition with LMC harrows sold for $36,500 at a farm auction in north­west Nebraska.

Since the Brillion was only used for one season, the nearly new price tag wasn’t a stretch. But what about the John Deere 970 cultimulcher that sold two days later near Casey, Ill.? It wasn’t new, but you wouldn’t know that from the $33,500 price tag. The 28' machine sold at a sale by Bauer Auction Service. It’s interesting to note the sale price is a whopping $15,500 more than the previous high on the same make and model.

More than 10 years earlier on Dec. 15, 2003, a 28' John Deere 970 sold for $12,250 at an auction in northeast Colorado. That high held for nearly seven years until a Sept. 11, 2010, auction in northwest Illinois where a 24' John Deere 970 sold for $15,700. That record price was smashed by a pair of John Deere 970s: $16,500 for a 24' that sold in west-central New York in early 2012 and then $18,000 for a 28' that sold on Dec. 3, 2013, at a farm auction in northeast Missouri.

Other recent record-breaking auction prices on cultimulchers include a 16' Brillion that sold for $8,400 at a Dec. 4, 2013, auction in west-central South Dakota. The same day, a 21' Brillion sold for $16,000 at an auction in east-central Indiana.

Why the run-up in values on used cultimulchers? A farmer friend who also sells seed speculates that since soybean seed sales are near-record levels, farmers want to roll their fields in order to get closer to the ground to harvest every last bean.

For the latest in used machinery values, follow Machinery Pete on the auction trail.